Kenya deports anti Obama author

October 7, 2008 12:00 am

Shares

By , NAIROBI, October 7 – Kenyan authorities on Tuesday deported the American author of a book attacking US Presidential candidate Barack Obama citing irregularities in his travel papers.

Jerome Robert Corsi who was scheduled to launch the book titled "The Obama Nation: Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality," on Tuesday morning was detained at the Nyayo House Immigration offices after police picked him from the hotel where the launch was to take place.

ADVERTISEMENT

The Public Relations Officer at the department Elias Njeru said Mr Corsi and his associate Timothy Bueler had been arrested because they did not have temporary work permits that are mandatory to conduct business in Kenya.

“Immigrations officers are going through Mr Corsi’s travel documents and he should be released if they are found to be in order,” Njeru said as the interrogation continued through the morning.

The two were however driven to the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in the afternoon where a police source said they were under instructions to guard Mr Corsi and his colleague until the time they would board a plane back to their country of origin later on Tuesday night.

In his book Mr Corsi questions Mr Obama’s character and his links with Prime Minister Raila Odinga. He also attacks the Illinois Senator’s suitability for the White House job.

The book that was released on August 1 claims Mr Obama is a dangerous, radical candidate for president and includes innuendoes and rumours that he was raised as a Muslim, attended a radical, black church and was ‘secretly seething with black rage.’

Mr Obama’s father – who is now deceased – was a Kenyan and the US senator enjoys wide support in East Africa.

Barack Obama, who was born in the United States, barely knew his Kenyan father who returned to his homeland when Mr Obama was a young boy.

The democratic presidential candidate was given a hero’s welcome during his 2006 visit to the Obama family village in Nyanza. His grandmother still lives there and is now a local celebrity.

Mr Corsi made a name by co-authoring ‘Unfit for Command,’ which maligned 2004 Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry’s Vietnam War record and is believed to have contributed to his defeat by President George W. Bush.